Hummingbird Hawkmoth

June 21-22, 2016

We saw this hummingbird hawkmoth flitting about the butterfly bush just our our breakfast room window on June 21. This is only my second experience with one, after my encounter with one on a lantana bush in 2007

This gives some perspective about what you see when the hawkmoth arrives. It looks like a bee at first glance, but it hovers like a hummingbird and uses its long proboscis which you can see in this photo.

In these images you can see the long tube reaching into the tiny flower blooms. What you can't really see is that he is hovering, moving about and maintaining the tube in the flower.

The hawkmoth let me get surprisingly close, and when I did, I got the hum of the wings just like a hummingbird.

The hawkmoth appears to be sitting, but he is not. I never saw him light.